THE   HISTORY  OF  TRADE 
UNIONISM  AMONG  WOMEN 
IN   BOSTON. 


THE    HISTORY    OF    TRADE    UNIONISM 
AMONG   WOMEN    IN    BOSTON. 


PUBLISHED  BY 

THE  WOMEN'S  TRADE  UNION  LEAGUE 

\v 

OF  MASSACHUSETTS. 


WOMEN'S   TRADE  UNION  LEAGUE 


NATIONAL  OFFICERS 

President           MRS.  ELLEN  M.  HENROTIN       .         .  of  Chicago 

Vice-President  Miss  JANE  ADDAMS    ....  of  Chicago 

Secretary           MRS.  MARY  K.  O'SULLIVAN      .         .  of  Boston 


MASSACHUSETTS  LEAGUE 

President  Mrs.  MARY  MORTON  KEHEW  .  3 1 7  Beacon  Street 

Vice-President  Mrs.  MARY  K.  O'SULLIVAN     .       88  Warrenton  Street 
Secretary  Miss  MABEL  GILLESPJE  ...         7  Park  Square 

Treasurer          Mr.  ARTHUR  M.  HUDDELL 

President  Boston  Central  Labor  Union 


EXECUTIVE  BOARD 

Mr.  JOHN  TOBIN  .  .  President  Boot  and  Shoe  Worker's  Union 
Mr.  HENRY  STERLING  .  Secretary  Boston  Typographical  Union 
Miss  MARY  HARTNETT  .  .  .  Boston  Typographical  Union 
Miss  LAURETTA  CORRIGAN  .  .  .  Bindery  Women's  Union 

Miss  ROSALIND  HUIDEKOPER Intervale,  N.  H. 

Miss  EMILY  BALCH Wellesley  College 

Miss  CHARLOTTE  PRICE   .        .         .        .         .        .  South  End  House 

Miss  ANNE  WITHINGTON          ....      Newburyport,  Mass. 


r*  o  r*  i\  K  4 


THE   HISTORY   OF   TRADE   UNIONISM   AMONG 
WOMEN    IN    BOSTON. 

A  Report  to  the  Executive    Committee  of    the  Women's 
Trade  Union  League  of  Massachusetts. 

INTRODUCTION. 

That  the  working  woman  has  an  industrial  problem  of 
her  own  quite  apart  from  that  which  the  workingman  has 
to  face,  is  well  recognized,  and  indeed  it  is  a  commonplace 
to  say  that  women,  more  frequently  than  men,  work  for 
low  wages,  long  hours  and  under  unsanitary  conditions. 
Without  discussing  this  problem  in  a  large  way,  it  has 
seemed  worth  while  to  raise  the  question,  how  far  is  trade 
unionism  a  means 'of  solving  the  problem  or  any  part  of  it? 
How  much  has  been  accomplished  in  the  past?  How  much 
of  promise  does  it  hold  for  the  future? 

In  attempting  an  answer,  it  seemed  best  to  present  an 
accurate  account,  so  far  as  it  could  be  obtained,  of  trade 
unionism  as  it  exists  and  as  it  has  existed  among  the 
women  of  this  city.  The  facts  have  been  stated  impartially 
if  sympathetically  in  the  belief  that  nothing  can  be  more 
illuminating  than  such  a  statement  and  in  order  that  these 
facts  may  be  judged — if  need  be — from  varied  points  of 
view.  A  preliminary  word  of  comment  is,  perhaps,  neces- 
sary to  point  out  how  far  the  trade  union  question  for 
women  is  different  from  the  same  question  for  men,  and 
why  the  movement  for  women,  has  been  so  belated. 

There  is  one  "primary  explanation"  for  the  fact  that 
women  are  underpaid,  over-worked,  and  victims  of  unsani- 
tary conditions.  They  are,  for  the  most  part,  untrained 
workers,  and  because  of  this  and  of  certain  custom-imposed 
limitations  regarding  what  is  called  "women's  work,"  there 
is  a  great  over-supply  of  labor  in  the  occupations  which  are 
open  to  them.  Trade  unionism  among  women,  therefore, 
presents  itself  as  one  phase  of  the  problem  of  the  organiza- 
tion of  unskilled  labor,  and  it  must  in  all  fairness  then  be 
asked:  Is  trade  unionism  the  best  method  of  helping 
women  who  are  unskilled  and  for  whom  the  field  of  em- 
ployment is  limited? 


This  question  can  be  fairly  answered  only  if  we  recognize 
that  there  is  seldom  a  single  direct  solution  to  any  social 
problem.  Instead  there  is  the  solution  for  the  future  which 
must  come  slowly  as  prejudices  are  overcome;  but  while 
we  are  waiting  for  this,  a  temporary  solution,  a  solution  of 
expediency  can  often  be  found,  which  will  mitigate  if  it  can- 
not remove,  some  evils  that  confront  us.  Thus  it  is  quite 
obvious  that  the  working  woman's  problems  can  be  solved 
for  the  future  by  giving  her  industrial  training  and  widen- 
ing her  field  of  employment,  just  as  the  economist  would 
solve  the  problem  of  the  unskilled  laborer  by  making  him 
efficient  and  thereby  making  fewer  of  him. 

But  this  does  not  help  the  two  million  women  who  are 
in  industry  today.  Their  time  for  serving  apprenticeships 
has  long  gone  by,  trade  schools  are  not  for  them,  and  the 
widening  of  the  field  of  employment  must  come  too  slowly 
ever  to  make  their  "looking  for  jobs"  any  easier.  For  these 
women,  organization  is  the  only  way  out.  It  may  not  offer 
the  final  solution,  but  it  is  the  only  immediately  practicable 
one.  Granted  the  unskilled  workman  and  the  over-supply 
of  unskilled  labor,  much  can  be  done  through  a  system  of 
collective  bargaining  in  the  way  of  a  fair  presentation  of 
the  case  to  the  employer  that  the  individual  workman  could 
not  hope  to  achieve,  and  within  such  limits  as  improvement 
is  possible  organization  can  bring  it.  An  organization  , 
means  much  too  for  women  because  it  gives  them  the  .1 
business  experience  of  which  they  stand  often  in  such  bit- 
ter need,  and  which  through  the  ages  they  have  been  de- 
nied, and  if  properly  managed,  it  should  awaken  a  class 
interest,  a  desire  to  improve  what  is  wrong,  not  only  for 
themselves,  but  for  those  who  come  after  them. 

It  will  be  seen  in  the  following  pages  that  .there  are  two 
different  methods  of  promoting  organization.  Obviously 
the  ideal  method  is  to  make  women  believe  in  the  righteous- 
ness of  the  cause  and  the  duty  of  supporting  a  conscious 
movement  for  their  betterment.  It  has,  however,  become 
a  policy  of  some  unions  to  persuade  the  employer  that  it 
will  be  to  his  advantage  to  use  the  union  "label"  as  a 
means  of  bidding  for  union  trade;  his  employees  then  are 
compelled  to  organize  whether  they  want  to  or  not,  and 
are  compelled  to  continue  membership  in  the  union  or  leave 

8 


the  shop.  If  it  is  disappointing  to  find  an  element  of  force 
instead  of  a  preaching  of  the  gospel  of  righteousness,  it 
must  be  remembered  that  the  provocation  is  great  and  that 
the  trade  unionist  is  not  alone  in  having  seized  a  cruder 
instrument  because  it  seemed  to  bring  results  more  quickly. 
The  very  difference  in  terms  is  significant.  The  "closed 
shop"  of  the  employer  is  the  "union"  or  "contract  shop" 
of  the  unionist.  It  means  to  the  latter  that  he  has  risen 
to  the  status  of  a  contractor — a  bargainer  for  his  share  of 
profit  in  the  enterprise.  To  him  the  union  label  is  the  out- 
ward and  visible  sign  of  his  entrance  into  the  world  of 
affairs  and  no  misuse  of  power,  no  ill-judged  action  on 
his  part,  should  blind  one  to  this  significance. 

In  conclusion  it  should  be  said  that  while  the  progress  of 
organization  among  women  may  seem  to  have  been  hope- 
lessly slow,  it  must  be  remembered  that  it  has  been  only  a 
short  time  relatively  since  the  leaders  of  the  movement 
have  realized  the  necessity  of  working  seriously  to  organize 
women;  that  their  wages  are  so  small  as  to  make  the  obli- 
gation of  paying  even  very  low  dues  a  burden;  and  that 
women  with  their  home  duties  and  family  demands  have 
had  almost  no  experience  in  working  together  or  in  the 
management  of  a  "business  concern  which  in  some  of  its 
aspects  a  trade  organization  must  necessarily  be.  And, 
finally,  it  cannot  be  too  strongly  emphasized  that  to  many 
women  the  trade  union,  with  the  opportunity  that  it  offers 
of  serving  a  great  cause,  and  making  personal  sacrifices  for 
the  good  of  a  great  class,  makes  rich  with  idealism  and 
hope  lives  that  are  poor  enough  in  all  ways  but  this.  Re- 
membering that  "without  vision  the  people  perish"  this 
alone  should  be  able  to  redeem  much  that  it  might  be  easy 
to  question  or  condemn. 


WOMEN  PRINTERS  AND  THE  TYPOGRAPHICAL 

UNION. 

The  history  of  trade  unionism  in  Boston  among  women 
in  the  printing  trade  is  of  rather  special  interest,  for  two 
reasons:  ist.  Because  women  have  long  been  identified 
with  the  trade;  2d.  Because  they  are  skilled  workers  and, 
for  the  most  part,  intelligent  and  mature  women  who  might 
be  expected  to  have  a  better  appreciation  of  the  value  of 
organization  than  the  young,  untrained  girls  in  candy  and 
box  factories  or  the  unskilled  foreign  women  in  the  sew- 
ing trades. 

Just  how  long  the  women  have  been  in  the  trade  in  Bos- 
ton it  is  not  easy  to  say,  but  probably  there  were  women 
compositors  in  some  of  the  offices  in  the  first  quarter  of 
the  last  century — and  perhaps  much  earlier.  Miss  Mart- 
ineau  mentioned  work  in  the  printing  offices'  as  one  of  the 
occupations  open  to  women  when  she  visited  this  country 
in  1836,  and  statistics  show  that  five  years  earlier  about 
two  hundred  women  were  employed  in  the  various  publish- 
ing houses  of  Boston.  But  however  many  women  there 
were  in  the  trade,  none  of  them  had  any  part  in  the  organi- 
zation of  the  printers  union, — now  known  as  Boston  Typo- 
graphical, No.  13, — in  the  year  1848.  The  attitude  of  the 
men  toward  women  compositors  was  not  friendly  at  this 
time,  and  as  late  even  as  1856  the  records  of  the  organiza- 
tion show  that  the  following  resolution  was  prepared 
(though  not  carried)  :  "That  this  society  discountenances 
any  member  working  in  any  office  that  employs  female 
compositors,  and  that  any  member  found  doing  so  be 
discharged  from  the  society."  Within  a  decade,  however, 
the  men  had  come  to  see  that  the  women  could  not  be 
driven  from  the  trade  and  that  the  relation  of  the  women 
to  the  wage  scale  must  be  faced  squarely  as  a  part  of  the 
problem  with  which  the  union  had  to  deal.  The  following 
resolutions  therefore  were  passed  in  1856: 

"Whereas,  The  impression  has  gone  abroad  that  this 
union  discountenances  the  employment  of  female  composi- 
tors, 

Resolved,  That  we  recommend  to  the  females  employed 
in  printing  offices  in  this  city  to  organize  in  such  a  man- 

10 


ner  as  shall  seem  best  to  themselves,  to  prevent  the  present 
prices  paid  to  them  from  being  lowered,  and  that  in  doing 
so  they  shall  receive  the  co-operation  of  this  union." 

In  February,  1870,  an  attempt  was  made  to  form  a 
Women's  Typographical  Union,  but  there  is  no  record  to 
show  that  more  than  one  meeting  was  ever  held,  and  the 
women  remained  unorganized.  It  was  not  until  sixteen 
years  later  that  the  union  again  took  up  the  matter  of  the 
admission  of  women  compositors,  and  in  1886,  nearly  forty 
years  after  its  formation,  twelve  women  were  admitted  into 
membership  in  Local  No.  13.  It  is  of  interest  to  know 
that  all  of  these  women  had  been  members  of  the 
Knights  of  Labor  for  some  years  and  were  by  no  means 
recent  converts  to  a  belief  in  organization.  In  the  twenty 
years  that  have  passed  since  their  names  were  added  to  its, 
roll  of  members,  the  history  of  the  "Boston  TypograhpP 
cal,"  so  far  as  it  relates  to  women,  has  been  very  brief. 
Because  of  the  large  preponderance  of  men,  the  long  dis- 
cussions,  in  which  they  are  not  expected  to  take  part,  and 
the  smoking,  the  women  find  it  unpleasant  to  attend  meet- 
ings. No  woman  has  ever  held  an  office,  and  no  woman's 
name  appears  on  the  list  of  delegates  that  have  been  sent 
from  time  to  time  to  the  meetings  of  the  national  organiza- 
tion of  the  American  Federation  of  Labor.  In  short,  while 
the  women  are  a  factor  of  grave  importance  in  the  trade, 
they  are  a  nullity  so  far  as  affairs  of  the  union  are  con- 
cerned. 

In  1893  an  office  in  the  city  which  supplied  plate  matter 
to  small  papers  came  into  conflict  with  the  union  because 
of  an  attempt  to  install  young  girls  of  three  months'  ap- 
prenticeship in  the  composing  room.  The  attempt  was  a 
failure,  owing  to  the  vigorous  opposition  of  the  union.  In 
the  same  year,  when  every  man,  woman  and  boy  had 
walked  out  of  the  office  of  the  Boston  "Telegram," — a 
strike  that  was  caused  by  a  cut  in  wages — much  bitterness 
arose  because  of  the  efforts  to  break  the  strike  by  the  em- 
ployment of  women.  "Herdic  loads"  of  them  were  said 
to  have  been  brought  in  from  a  "Kindergarten  in  Corn- 
hill,"  the  term  kindergarten  indicating,  of  course,  that  they 
were  far  from  having  reached  the  journeyman's  stand- 
ard of  excellence.  During  the  two  strikes,  those  of  1904 

ii 


and  1906,  the  women  have  not,  on  the  whole,  been  as  loyal 
as  the  men,  but  the  few  "faithful  among  the  faithless," 
have  shown  great  courage  and  a  spirit  of  self-sacrificing 
devotion  that  would  be  hard  to  parallel.  One  of  them,  who 
is  known  to  be  the  most  competent  woman  printer  in  the 
city,  and  who  was  receiving  nineteen  dollars  a  week  before 
the  last  strike  was  called,  never  stopped  to  question  whether 
she  as  an  individual  might  not  lose  all  and  gain  nothing,  but 
went  out  at  once,  saying  simply  that  the  cause  was  right, 
and  some  of  the  others  would  suffer  more  than  she. 

These  bits  of  union  history  serve  to  show  that  the  woman 
compositor  has  seemed  at  times  to  block  the  path  of  prog- 
ress, but  to  those  who  would  blame  the  women  for  a  selfish 
lack  of  foresight  in  their  refusal  to  join  the  union  or  to  be 
loyal  to  it  after  they  have  joined,  it  must  be  sai^  that  join- 
ing the  union  means  to  most  of  these  women  not  an  imme- 
diate personal  gain,  but  an  immediate  personal  sacrifice. 
Belonging  to  the  union  and  being  loyal  to  it  means,  for 
them,  possessing  the  finest  kind  of  idealism, — a  belief  in  a 
cause  which  requires  long  devotion,  which  may  cost  the 
individual  much  and  which  brings  a  recompense  only  in 
the  consciousness  of  having  served  one's  class. 

The  difference  between  the  position  of  the  men  and  the 
women  in  the  trade  which  explains  the  difference  in  their 
relations  to  the  union  is  not  so  difficult  to  understand  as 
might  at  first  appear.  Printing  is  a  skilled  trade.  A  boy 
is  required  to  serve  a  four  years'  apprenticeship  to  become 
a  journeyman.  There  is  no  chance  for  the  girl  to  serve 
such  an  apprenticeship,  however  much  she  desires  to  be- 
come a  competent  workman.  She  "steals  the  trade,"  there- 
fore, as  the  men  say;  that  is,  she  learns  it  imperfectly  in- 
stead of  undergoing  a  course  of  thorough  training.  She 
learns  only  one  branch  of  the  trade,  "setting  up  straight 
matter,"  and  although  she  may  become  very  efficient  in  this 
part  of  the  work,  can  never  be  the  all-round,  efficient 
printer  that  the  man  who  comes  out  of  his  four  years'  term 
of  service  ought  to  be.  She  is  handicapped  at  the  start, 
then,  in  "looking  for  a  job."  She  is,  in  a  sense,  no  matter 
how  ambitious  or  faithful  she  may  be,  "inferior  help,"  and 
the  result  is  that  she  is  tempted  to  take  a  lower  wage  for 
fear  of  getting  none  at  all.  The  union  scale,  week  work,  in 

12 


Boston  is  eighteen  dollars  for  an  eight-hour  day.  Few 
women  are  capable  of  earning  this  and  there  are  undoubt- 
edly several  hundred  girls  and  women  in  the  city  who  are 
working  for  less  than  ten  dollars  a  week.  To  these  girls 
coming  into  the  union  means  the  loss  of  their  job,  and  ttuey 
refuse  to  join. 

There  are  other  factors  working  with  this  which  have 
made  the  progress  of  organization  slow  among  the  women. 
Many  of  the  men  of  the  union,  while  nominally  encourag- 
ing the  organization  of  women,  have  been  covertly 
hostile  or  indifferent,  and  they  have  made  much  less  effort 
to  "preach  the  gospel"  to  women  than  to  men.  The  whole 
history  of  the  union  illustrates  this.  The  men  found  that 
the  women  compositors  had  to  be  reckoned  with.  In  the 
first  half  of  the  last  century  the  union  tried  to  frown  them 
out  of  the  trade.  It  then  recommended  that  they  form  a 
union  of  their  own,  and  it  was  only  by  long  and  bitter  ex- 
perience that  the  men  began  to  see  that  the  non-union 
woman  was  a  competitor  to  be  treated  like  the  non-union 
man,  and  it  is  questionable  whether  most  of  the  men  see  it 
today. 

It  would  be  hard  to  find  a  situation  more  discouraging,  in 
many  ways,  than  the  disorganized  condition  of  the  women 
in  the  printing  trade.  They  are  now  admitted  to  the  union 
on  the  same  terms  as  the  men,  they  pay  the  same  dues  and 
receive  the  same  benefits.  Th  union  sees  its  only  safety  in 
maintaining  the  principle  of  equal  pay  for  men  and  women 
and  it  is  maintained  resolutely.  But  very  few  women,  an 
insignificant  percentage  of  the  total  number  in  the  trade, 
become  members. 

The  difficulty,  however,  is  not  without  a  remedy.  One 
of  the  greatest  obstacles,  as  has  been  pointed  out,  is  this 
very  principle  of  equal  pay,  when  the  women  are  not 
capable  of  equal  work,  and  it  can  be  overcome  only  by 
recognizing  it  as  fundamental  that  if  women  are  to  com- 
pete with  men,  they  must  be  given  .the  same  training  as 
men.  If  girls  as  well  as  boys  are  going  to  enter  industrial 
life  they  must  be  trained  to  enter  it  self-respectingly. 
Trained  efficiency  and  a  workmanlike  ideal,  and  all  that 
is  essentially  hopeless  disappears  from  the  situation. 

'3 


THE  WOMEN  BOOKBINDERS'  UNION. 

The  book-binding  industry  lends  itself  to  a  carefully 
drawn  line  of  distinction  between  "women's  work"  and 
"men's  work."  There  would  seem  in  many  cases  to  be  no 
reason  for  this  save  a  desire  to  follow  in  the  paths  of  tra- 
dition. A  spirited  discussion  that  was  once  overheard  be- 
tween representatives  of  the  women's  and  men's  organiza- 
tions as  to  whether  "the  boss  or  the  union"  had  made  work 
on  a  certain  new  machine  "a  man's  job"  indicates  that  the 
line  of  delimitation  is  an  arbitrary,  rather  than  a  necessary 
one.  A  further  reason  for  this  line  between  the  men  and 
women  in  the  trade  is  that  the  men  serve  a  four  years'  ap- 
prenticeship and  the  women  none  at  all.  There  is  not,  in 
any  part  of  the  work,  direct  competition  between  men  and 
women.  The  result  of  this  is,  of  course,  that  men  and 
women  are  in  separate  local  unions,  which  have  no  official 
connection,  although  both  are  affiliated  with  the  same  na- 
tional organization.  The  men's  union  is  much  older  and 
the  members  pay  higher  dues  and  receive  larger  benefits 
than  in  the  women's.  Except  for  the  fact  that  the  average 
of  intelligence  is  quite  as  high  among  the  women  as  among 
the  men,  the  difference  between  the  two  organizations  is 
much  like  differences  usually  found  between  unions  in 
skilled  and  those  in  unskilled  trades.  It  must  not,  however, 
be  inferred  that  all  of  the  "women's  work"  is  unskilled. 
Sewing  the  backs  of  the  books,  for  example,  requires  not 
only  experience  and  training,  but  considerable  intelligence 
as  well.  If  this  part  of  the  work  were  a  "man's  job,"  it 
would  command  good  wages. 

There  was  no  movement  for  organization  among  the 
women  until  about  a  decade  ago,  when  there  came  to  be  a 
demand  for  the  label  and  a  chance  to  organize  through 
that  means.  In  the  year  1896  the  union,  which  is  still  in 
existence,  was  granted  a  charter.  There  were  originally 
only  fifteen  members, — all  of  the  women  employed  in  the 
shop  which  wished  to  use  the  label, — and  after  ten  years 
the  number  is  still  very  small,  almost  incredibly  small  in 
proportion  to  the  total  number  in  the  trade,  for  Boston 
has  long  been  a  great  book-binding  center.  Representa- 
tives of  the  union  have  a  voice  in  the  "allied  printing  trades 

H 


council,"  and  the  familiar  label  cannot  be  used  unless  the 
"bindery  girls"  in  the  shop  join  the  union. 

There  has  been  from  the  beginning  some  friction  be- 
tween the  women's  and  men's  organizations — a  subject 
difficult  to  discuss  without  prejudice.  The  men  and  women 
of  course  have  separate  wage  scales,  and  it  has  been 
charged  that  the  men  have  persistently  discouraged  any 
attempt  on  the  part  of  the  women  to  raise  their  scale — 
which  is,  of  course,  much  lower  than  the  men's,  because  of 
a  feeling  on  the  part  of  the  men  that  they  would  get  what 
the  women  didn't.  The  result,  it  has  been  claimed,  is,  that 
while  "average  wages"  in  the  trade  may  have  improved, 
the  whole  loaf  has  gone  to  the  men.  It  must  in  all  fair- 
ness be  said  that  the  men  disclaim  having  followed  a  selfish 
policy,  but  it  is  undeniable  that  their  own  union,  which  is 
a  very  strong  one,  has  not,  to  say  the  least,  shown  a  spirit 
of  generosity  in  giving  moral  support  to  the  new  and 
struggling  union  among  the  women. 

One  of  the  great  drawbacks  to  organization  has  been 
the  removal  of  several  large  establishments  to  towns  near- 
by. There,  it  is  said,  "the  boss  gets  the  natives  to  work 
cheap;  the  natives  think  the  boss  'made  them,'  and  of 
course  he's  a  great  man.  They  go  to  the  boss's  Sunday 
School  and  the  boss  has  Fourth  of  July  celebrations.  Gen- 
erally and  all  round,  the  boss  is  the  whole  thing.  The  girls 
all  live  at  home  and  don't  care  anything  about  the  condi- 
tion of  the  trade  as  a  whole,  and  attempts  to  organize  them 
are  fruitless." 

In  the  union  that  exists,  however,  there  is  a  fine  spirit 
of  loyalty.  While  it  was  in  origin  a  label  union,  yet  many 
of  the  women  who  now  belong  are  firm  believers  in  "the 
movement,"  and  have  a  conscious  pride  in  its  history.  They 
serve  because  they  believe  and  not  because  they  hope  to  be 
served  in  turn. 

In  some  cases  very  marked  benefits  have  come  through 
the  organization.  Shorter  hours  and  higher  wages,  and 
the  small  dues  (twenty-five  cents  a  month  and  an  initia- 
tion fee  of  one  dollar)  give  a  death  benefit  of  fifty  dollars 
through  the  national  organization.  The  union  has  been 
fortunate  in  having  among  its  members  some  of  the  strong- 
est women  in  the  trade  union  movement. 

'5 


THE  TWO  UNIONS  AMONG  THE  LAUNDRY 
WORKERS. 

If  industrial  regeneration  is  to  come  through  organiza- 
tion, there  is  certainly  pressing  need  for  it  among  the  laun- 
dry workers.  Conditions  in  the  trade  are  almost  invariably 
bad.  On  its  sanitary  side  the  industry  is  badly  neglected. 
Few  precautions  are  taken  to  make  the  handling  of  soiled 
linen  less  unhygienic  for  the  "markers'*  and  "sorters." 
Many  of  the  mangles  and  others  parts  of  the  machinery 
are  not  properly  safeguarded.  Rooms  are  badly  ventilated, 
and  pressure  on  a  few  days  and  in  certain  seasons  makes 
the  hours  often  very  irregular.  An  attempt  has  been  made 
to  remedy  some  of  these  evils  by  legislation,  but  the  fac- 
tory laws  have  not  so  far  been  very  effective,  and  it  now 
remains  to  be  seen  whether  or  not  the  workers  can  do 
something  for  themselves.  The  backward  conditions  in  the 
industry  are  undoubtedly  due  in  part  to  the  fact  that  it 
was  belated  in  leaving  the  home  and  has  not  had  time  to 
"grow  up"  properly.  Much  of  the  work  is  unskilled  and 
except  for  the  running  of  the  heavy  washing  machines  is 
practically  done  by  women. 

The  first  union,  which  was  organized  in  1896,  had  a 
unique  and  interesting  history.  The  momentum  came,  not 
through  the  compulsion  of  the  label,  but  because  of  a 
belief  in  organization  as  the  one  means  by  which  the  em- 
ployees could  improve  conditions  in  the  trade.  A  woman 
who  had  been  instrumental  in  the  formation  of  the  Gar- 
ment Workers'  and  Bindery  Women's  Unions,  who  came 
from  the  west,  where,  as  an  old  Hull  House  habitue,  she 
had  organized  the  first  bindery  girls'  union  in  Chicago, 
went  about  at  this  time  from  laundry  to  laundry,  "preach- 
ing the  gospel"  with  great  enthusiasm.  The  result  was 
the  formation  of  a  union  of  nearly  one  hundred  members 
in  its  first  year.  Conditions  seemed  so  hopelessly  bad  at 
the  time  that  they  came  to  believe  that  the  only  way  out 
was  to  start  a  laundry  of  their  own.  They  hoped  to  get 
work  from  union  men,  and  plans  for  the  enterprise  were 
developed  rapidly.  The  union  gave  a  ball,  and  with  the 
proceeds  added  to  their  fund  they  started  a  co-operative 
laundry,  which  they  were  able  to  run  for  three  months.  It 

16 


failed,  as  other  such  attempts  have  failed,  because  none  of 
the  members  had  had  any  business  experience.  Great 
courage  and  devotion  were  shown  by  some  of  the  women, 
who  worked  early  and  late,  trying  to  establish  the  laundry 
on  a  paying  basis.  One  woman  used  to  begin  work  at  four 
or  five  o'clock  in  the  morning  and  work  late  into  the  night 
trying  to  turn  out  the  work  promptly  and  in  some  way 
help  meet  expenses.  Some  who  could  not,  without  sacri- 
ficing others  as  well  as  themselves,  give  up  their  positions, 
came  over  and  worked  in  the  evening  when  their  own  work 
was  done,  or  early  in  the  morning  before  it  began.  When 
they  saw  that  it  was  all  hopeless  and  that  the  laundry 
would  have  to  be  given  up,  they  gave  up  the  union  too,  as 
they  grew  gradually  more  discouraged,  but  the  thing  that 
they  have  never  given  up  is  their  belief  in  the  righteous- 
ness of  the  cause  itself. 

The  present  organization  is  one  of  the  most  recent  of 
the  women's  unions  in  Boston,  and  owes  its  existence,  as 
do  many  others,  to  the  value  of  the  label  as  a  means  of 
commanding  "union  trade."  It  was  organized  in  a  laundry 
which  makes  a  specialty  of  barbers'  and  waiters'  coats  and 
aprons,  and  was  favored  by  the  employer  as  a  means  of 
increasing  patronage.  There  were  at  the  outset  about 
forty-five  members,  but  the  number  has  nearly  tripled  in 
three  years.  The  membership  is  increased,  not  by  convert- 
ing the  women  to  a  belief  in  the  value  of  organization,  but 
by  converting  employers  to  a  belief  in  the  value  of  the  label. 
While  the  idealism  of  the  former  method  is  lacking  at  the 
outset,  it  is  often  possible  to  develop  it  later,  and  there  is 
always  a  hope  that  women  who  originally  came  in  because 
they  had  to  "join  or  quit,"  may  come  to  be  helpful  and 
loyal  members.  The  dues  are  necessarily  small  (twenty- 
five  cents  a  month)  and  there  are  no  benefits.  The  union 
is  affiliated  with  the  International  Shirt  Waist  and  Laundry 
Workers'  Union,  and  with  the  American  Federation  of 
Labor. 

Although  it  is  too  soon  to  look  for  "results,"  it  may  be 
said  that  conditions  in  the  original  union  laundry  have  im- 
proved,— a  nine  hour  day  and  a  minimum  wage  of  six  dol- 
lars have  been  established. 


THE  LOCAL  UNION  AMONG  THE  HAT 
TRIMMERS. 

In  the  making  of  felt  hats,  the  "trimming"  is  exclusively 
women's  work,  and  the  industry  in  Boston,  which  is  a  rela- 
tively small  one,  is  so  thoroughly  organized  that  all  of  the 
women  in  the  trade  are  in  the  union.  But  in  the  trade  the 
employers  have  recognized  the  commercial  value  of  the 
union  label,  and  the  closed  shop  agreement  has  made  the 
union.  There  are,  however,  in  this  as  in  other  such  or- 
ganizations, some  women  who  believe  whole-heartedly  in 
the  cause,  and  who  would  support  theu  nion,  label  or  no 
label. 

The  Hat  Trimmers'  Union  was  formed  in  1886  and 
joined  the  Knights  of  Labor  as  an  organization  that  same 
year.  The  influence  of  the  individual  has  been  strong 
here,  for  the  affiliation  with  the  "Knights"  was  attributed 
solely  to  the  influence  of  one  man  who  was  an  active 
"Knight"  himself,  and  who  was  able  to  carry  with  him 
first  his  whole  shop  and  later  the  trade.  The  organization 
now  is  only  a  local  union,  affiliated  neither  with  the  Ameri- 
can Federation  of  Labor  nor  with  a  national  organization 
in  the  trade.  The  union  among  the  men,  who  monopolize 
the  work  of  making  the  hats,  is  one  which  strongly  sup- 
ports the  closed  shop  policy  and  makes  effective  use  of  the 
"Hatters'  Label."  The  necessity  of  organizing  the  women 
is  recognized  by  the  men,  and  there  is  an  unwritten  agree- 
ment between  the  men's  and  women's  unions  to  the  effect 
that  if  there  is  any  trouble  the  men  will  "stand  by"  the 
women  and  the  women  by  the  men.  Dues  for  the  women 
are  extremely  small, — only  fifteen  cents  a  quarter,  but  as- 
sessments are  sometimes  made  and  a  death  benefit  of  fifty 
dollars  is  maintained. 

This  organization  among  the  hatters  is  the  oldest 
women's  union  in  Boston,  but  it  has  had  a  very  passive  his- 
tory, and  is  by  no  means  the  largest  one  at  the  present  time. 
The  original  membership  of  one  hundred  has  increased  to 
175,  the  closed  shop  agreement  keeping  the  growth  of  the 
union  equal  to  the  growth  of  the  trade.  There  have  been 
no  strikes  and  no  conspicuous  controversies.  Unfortu- 
nately, the  union  has  lacked  throughout  its  history  the  in- 

18 


spiration  which  comes  through  association  with  a  national 
organization.  Such  an  association  brings  with  it  a  belief 
in  the  larger  value  of  the  movement  that  comes  in  no  other 
way. 


WOMEN  IN  THE  CIGAR    MAKERS'    AND  CIGAR 
PACKERS'  UNIONS. 

The  situation  in  the  cigar  making  industry  is  in  many 
respects  unique.  The  trade  is  so  thoroughly  organized  that 
practically  every  cigar  maker  in  Boston  is  in  the  union. 
There  is  no  tenement  work  and  wages  are  higher  and  hours 
are  shorter  than  in  any  other  city,  east  or  west.  There  are, 
however,  relatively  fewer  women  in  the  Boston  trade  than 
elsewhere. 

A  three  years'  apprenticeship  is  required,  and  although 
there  is  no  union  rule  against  it,  it  is  very  rare  to  find  a 
girl  serving  a  term.  Last  winter  there  were  between  150 
and  200  boys  and  but  one  girl  apprenticed  here,  and  the 
one  girl  was  serving  in  the  small  shop  of  a  relative. 

The  women  cigar  makers,  then,  are  almost  without  ex- 
ception, foreigners  who  have  learned  the  trade,  either  in 
London  or  on  the  continent.  They  understand  very  little 
of  what  organization  means  and  belong  to  the  union  be- 
cause the  closed  shop  contracts  are  in  force  and  it  is  the 
only  way  they  can  "keep  their  jobs."  The  men  so  out- 
number the  women  that  the  situation  is  in  some  respects 
much  like  that  in  the  Typographical  Union, — it  is  really 
a  men's  organization,  officered  and  managed  by  men,  but 
having  a  few  women  members  who  do  not  attend  the 
meetings.  But  the  women  cigar  makers  who  have  been 
trained  abroad  are  really  as  efficient  as  the  men,  and  the 
maintenance  by  the  union  of  the  same  wage  scale  for  both 
women  and  men  has  been  a  very  great  advantage  to  the 
women. 

What  has  been  said  of  the  relations  of  the  women  cigar 
makers  to  the  trade  and  the  union  is  also  true  of  the  women 
engaged  in  cigar  packing — a  separate  trade  with  a  separate 
union.  There  are  not  more  than  two  or  three  women  pack- 
ers in  the  city.  They  get  very  good  wages  indeed,  belong 
to  the  union,  but  pay  the  fine  for  non-attendance  rather  than 
go  to  the  meetings.  As  one  of  them  said,  "the  Union  is 
a  place  for  men,  but  it  has  helped  me  and  I  ought  to  be- 
long." 


20 


THE  TOBACCO   STRIPPERS'  UNION. 

The  organization  among  the  cigar  factory  tobacco  strip- 
pers is  the  largest  and  most  interesting  women's  union  in 
the  city,  and  one  that  furnishes  an  admirable  example  of 
what  the  women  in  a  trade  can  do  to  improve  their  own 
condition.  The  union  originated  as  a  means  of  remedying 
a  pressing  grievance,  but  the  trade  contained  an  unusually 
large  proportion  of  intelligent,  energetic  women  who  had 
long  been  convinced  of  the  necessity  of  an  organization, 
and  who  were  able  to  hold  the  union  together,  even  after 
the  immediate  need  for  it  had  passed.  Unionism  was  not 
a  new  thing  to  many  of  these  women.  Some  of  them  were 
daughters  and  sisters  of  unionists  and  familiar  with  union 
principles;  others  had  belonged  to  the  Knights  of  Labor 
in  the  eighties.  In  1890  a  definite  attempt  was  made  to 
organize,  but  it  seemed  impossible  to  interest  the  girls. 

Conditions  in  the  trade,  however,  were  steadily  deterio- 
rating. There  were,  among  others,  two  chief  grievances: 
i.  The  stock  was  bad,  which,  of  course,  made  piece  work 
earnings  relatively  much  lower;  2.  Although  the  em- 
ployees were  paid  according  to  the  amount  of  tobacco 
stripped,  the  stock  was  weighed  for  them  and  they  had 
no  way  of  computing  the  wages  due  them  at  the  end  of 
the  week.  There  were  frequent  complaints  of  unfair 
weighing,  and  many  of  the  women  believed  they  were  being 
paid  less  than  they  earned.  For  this  reason  and  because  of 
the  low  scale,  wages  were  very  unsatisfactory. 

Finally,  in  the  fall  of  1899,  a  spirited  and  independent 
girl  in  one  of  the  large  factories  complained  to  the  fore- 
man of  unfair  treatment  in  the  weighing  of  her  stock.  She 
was  discharged  at  once,  but  all  of  the  girls  in  the  factory 
went  with  her  and  marched  in  a  body  down  across  the 
Common  to  the  headquarters  of  the  Cigar  Makers'  Union. 
The  difficulty  was  finally  adjusted  in  favor  of  the  girls,  and 
fortunately  the  opportunity  of  organizing  was  not  lost.  At 
a  mass  meeting  of  all  the  tobacco  strippers  in  the  city,  the 
present  union  was  formed.  Originally  there  were  about 
three  hundred  members,  but  the  number  has  now  reached 
nearly  seven  hundred.  The  closed  shop  prevails,  and  while 
none  of  the  members  was  originally  forced  in  by  this 

21 


means,  there  are  undoubtedly  a  good  many  members  today 
who  belong  only  because  they  are  obliged  to.  This  is  not 
strange  when  one  remembers  that  a  large  number  of  na- 
tionalities are  represented  in  the  trade,  and  that  many  of 
the  women  do  not  speak  English.  The  union,  however,  has 
conferred  such  direct  and  unmistakable  benefits  that  only 
an  extreme  lack  of  understanding  can  explain  a  failure  to 
support  it.  The  eight-hour  day  exists  throughout  the  city 
with  a  Saturday  half-holiday  in  the  summer.  The  wage 
scale  has  been  very  materially  increased  and  a  fair  system 
of  weighing  stock  is  now  in  force.  There  are  some  inci- 
dental benefits  too  which  should  not  be  overlooked.  An 
agreement  exists  between  the  union  and  the  employers 
which  cannot  be  broken  by  either  party  without  a  month's 
notice.  Moreover,  the  employer  deals  now  with  the  union 
and  not  with  the  individual,  and  complaints  are  made  and 
adjusted  with  little  difficulty.  Very  useful  business  experi- 
ence has  been  gained  too  by  the  women  who  have  been  the 
leaders  in  the  signing  of  important  business  agreements 
and  in  the  organization  and  maintenance  of  a  system  of 
benefits.  The  dues  are  fifty  cents  a  month;  both  sick  and 
death  benefits  are  paid,  and  special  help  is  given  to  mem- 
bers in  distress. 

With  regard  to  the  form  of  organization,  it  is  of  interest 
to  know  that  while  the  moral  support  of  the  cigar  makers' 
union  has  been  very  helpful,  still  the  men  have  had  no  offi- 
cial connection  with  the  union,  which  is  an  independent 
local,  affiliated  only  with  the  American  Federation  of  La- 
bor. Not  being  affiliated  with  the  cigar  makers'  union  a 
great  embarrassment  arose  at  the  time  of  the  last  cigar 
makers'  strike.  Technically  the  strippers  were  not  on 
strike — only  out  of  work,  and  therefore  could  not  touch 
their  defense  fund.  It  has  been  from  start  to  finish  an  in- 
dependent women's  organization,  officered,  financed,  de- 
veloped and  maintained  by  a  group  of  capable  and  enthu- 
siastic women. 

To  successfully  manage  a  business  organization  of  seven 
hundred  members  is  to  achieve  something,  but  to  train 
seven  hundred  persons  of  different  races  and  creeds  to 
work  together  and  to  believe  in  and  be  loyal  to  a  great 
class  movement  is  to  achieve  much  more;  and  the  tobacco 
strippers  have  gone  a  long  way  towards  doing  both. 


ORGANIZATIONS  AMONG  THE  GARMENT 
WORKERS. 

In  attempting  organization  in  the  sewing  trades  one  is 
confronted  not  with  a  single  problem,  but  with  a  series  of 
problems.  A  trade  union  among  house  finishers  is  as  dif- 
ferent from  a  trade  union  among  coat  makers,  as  a  teams- 
ters' organization  is  different  from  a  railway  brotherhood. 
The  term  "Garment  Makers"  covers  all  grades  of  skill  and 
almost  all  possible  nationalities,  and,  as  everywhere,  the 
groups  most  difficult  to  unionize  is  the  group  most  vic- 
timized, because  it  is  the  largest,  most  unskilled,  and  most 
un-American. 

It  is  necessary,  then,  in  discussing  the  sewing  trades  to 
give  separate  accounts  of  each  of  the  unions  in  the  city 
affiliated  with  the  United  Garment  Workers  of  America, 
and  an  account  also  of  such  organizations  as  have  been 
attempted  among  the  makers  of  women's  ready-made  cloth- 
ing,— organizations  which  were  affiliated  with  the  Ladies' 
Garment  Workers,  and  of  which  no  trace  now  remains, 
save  sixty-five  dollars  in  the  treasury  of  the  defunct  Wrap- 
per Makers'  Union. 

In  Boston,  the  following  organizations  among  the 
makers  of  men's  and  boys'  "ready  to  wear"  garments  have 
women  members:  (i)  Overall  and  Sheepskin  Workers' 
Unions;  (2)  Pressmen's  Union;  (3)  Coat  Makers' 
Union;  (4)  Pants  Makers'  Union;  (5)  Vest  Makers' 
Union.  Only  men  belong  to  the  unions  among  the  cutters, 
cap  makers  and  knee  pants  makers. 

(i).     Overall  and  Sheepskin  Workers'  Union. 

By  far  the  most  interesting  organization  in  this  group 
and  the  most  hopeful  one  so  far  as  the  women  are  con- 
cerned, is  the  "Overall  Makers'  Union,"  as  it  is  commonly 
called.  Ninety  per  cent,  of  the  employees  in  the  trade  are 
women,  who  dominate  also  in  affairs  of  the  union.  Not 
only  are  the  important  local  officers, — president,  secretary, 
and  business  agent— women,  but  even  the  business  agent 
for  the  national  organization  is  a  woman,  who  signs  im- 
portant contracts  with  the  largest  firms  in  the  country. 

23 


"Boston  Local  No.  163"  was  organized  in  1901,  because 
working  men  who  were  unionists  had  begun  to  demand  a 
union  label  on  overalls.  At  first  the  union  included  only 
the  employees  of  the  single  house  that  used  the  label.  Two 
years  later,  one  of  the  makers  of  men's  sheepskin  coats 
which  are  used  by  teamsters,  found  that  the  label  was  in 
demand,  and  he  at  once  organized  his  factory.  These 
sheepskin  workers,  though  forced  in  by  the  label,  devel- 
oped into  very  enthusiastic  supporters  of  the  union,  and  if 
the  closed  shop  agreement  were  given  up  today  at  least 
two-thirds  of  them  would  voluntarily  retain  their  mem- 
bership. These  women  more  than  those  from  the  overall 
factories  (some  others  of  which  are  now  unionized)  are 
devoted  adherents  of  "the  movement,"  and  yet  no  direct 
material  benefits  have  come  to  them  personally.  While 
wages  in  the  overall  trade  have  been  increased,  the  sheep- 
skin workers  receive  the  same  pay  and  work  the  same  num- 
ber of  hours  as  before,  though  the  label  has  increased  their 
employer's  business  by  one-third.  Their  dues  for  the  sup- 
port of  the  organization  are  thirty  cents  a  month  and  there 
are  no  "benefits."  Indeed  it  would  be  hard  to  find  a  clearer 
case  of  desiring  to  promote  a  cause  for  the  sake  of  the 
cause  alone. 

Eight  months  after  these  sheepskin  workers  came  into 
the  union,  the  national  organization  ordered  that  the  char- 
ter be  given  up  and  that  the  members  join  a  union  of  rub- 
ber workers  which  had  just  started  and  was  composed  of 
twenty  or  thirty  men.  The  women  objected  strongly,  and 
taxed  every  member  in  the  shop  a  dollar  in  order  to  send 
two  women  on  to  have  a  conference  with  the  national  offi- 
cers in  New  York,  where,  fortunately,  they  were  able  to 
carry  their  point.  They  said  they  were  willing,  if  it 
seemed  best,  to  take  the  men  into  their  organization,  but 
they  were  unwilling  to  give  up  their  identity,  and  they  won 
their  point.  It  is  worth  noting,  too,  that  this  union  has 
maintained  its  business  relations  on  an  irreproachable 
plane.  When  a  chance  came  to  increase  the  membership 
roll  by  unionizing  the  shop  of  a  questionable  firm,  the  union 
refused  to  do  it,  although  considerable  pressure  was 
brought  to  bear  by  men  in  other  unions,  to  whom  it  seemed 
"bad  business"  to  refuse. 

24 


This  union,  which  began  in  1901  with  the  unionizing  of 
a  shop  of  fifty-six  employees,  now  has  about  three  hundred 
members,  twenty-five  of  whom  are  men.  The  men  in  the 
trade  do  the  cutting  and  part  of  the  stitching  on  the  skin 
coats.  Some  of  the  work  on  these  coats  is  very  heavy  and 
beyond  the  strength  of  most  women.  In  addition  to  the 
employees  in  the  overall  and  sheepskin  coat  factories,  the 
union  has  some  members  engaged  in  the  making  of  duck 
coats.  They  were  obliged  to  join  too,  through  the  label, 
in  order  that  the  employer  might  sell  his  coats  to  union 
barbers,  bartenders  and  waiters.  These  women,  about 
thirty  in  number,  with  a  single  exception,  take  no  interest 
in  the  union,  but  the  one  woman  who  makes  the  exception 
is  one  of  the  most  loyal  union  women  in  the  city,  and  will 
always  be  glad  to  serve,  quite  regardless  of  the  label  or  any 
other  sign  of  compulsion. 

By  way  of  summary,  it  may  be  pointed  out  that  this 
rather  miscellaneous  organization  of  overall  makers,  sheep- 
skin workers  and  duck  coat  makers  is  in  some  respects  a 
very  interesting  one.  It  has  been  from  the  beginning  a 
"label  union,"  forced  to  organize  and  to  maintain  an  or- 
ganization in  order  that  the  employer  might  get  union 
trade.  Yet  among  these  three  hundred  women  who  were 
forced  into  the  labor  movement  is  a  very  strong  nucleus  of 
those  who  understand  and  believe  in  the  movement  and 
will  always  stand  by  their  colors.  It  is  just  this  that  re- 
deems the  label  union,  for  out  of  every  such  organization 
come  some  "true  believers"  who  will  never  be  recreant  to 
a  faith  that  is  strong  within  them. 

(2.)     Coats,  Pants,  and  Vest  Makers'  Unions  and  the 
Pressmen's  Union. 

The  women  who  are  employed  in  making  men's  clothing 
are  machine  operators,  pressers,  basters,  finishers,  and  the 
like.  The  cutting,  the  most  skilled  and  best  paid  occupa- 
tion in  the  trade,  is  "men's  work."  Originally  this  was 
because  the  work  was  extremely  heavy,  but  since  the  new 
electric  cutting  knife  has  come  into  use  there  is  no  reason 
why  women  should  not  be  employed  in  this  occupation. 
However,  the  fact  that  they  are  now  excluded  from  it  is 

25 


one  explanation  of  the  preponderance  of  men  among  or- 
ganized garment  workers,  for  it  is  always  the  skilled  part 
of  the  trade  that  is  easiest  to  unionize. 

The  first  union  among  the  women  garment  workers 
was  formed  more  than  a  decade  ago.  The  men  in  the  trade 
had  struck  for  higher  wages  and  a  union  shop.  The  women 
were  necessarily  thrown  out  of  work,  and  as  they  sympa- 
thized with  the  men,  they  formed  an  organization  support- 
ing the  demands  of  the  men's  union.  This  early  union  had 
seven  or  eight  hundred  women  members,  and  was  very 
prosperous  for  two  years,  at  the  end  of  which  time  it  went 
to  pieces.  The  reason  for  its  failure  is  interesting.  The 
manager  of  one  of  the  large  department  stores  had  come  to 
union  headquarters  during  the  strike  and  offered  to  grant 
the  demands  of  the  union  without  signing  a  contract.  The 
union  officers,  quick  to  see  the  effect  the  press  headlines, 
"Demands  of  Garment  Workers  Granted  by  Large  Em- 
ployer" would  have  on  the  smaller  firms,  accepted  the 
terms,  and  the  strike  was  soon  broken.  The  union  gained 
a  nine-hour  day,  an  increase  in  wages,  and  the  establish- 
ment of  a  minimum  wage  of  a  dollar  a  day  for  women. 
After  two  years,  one  of  the  contractors  of  the  department 
store  that  had  first  yielded,  broke  the  agreement.  Then 
the  firm  that  previously  had  used  its  balance  of  power  to  the 
advantage  of  the  strikers,  now  refused  to  grant  the  de- 
mands of  the  workers,  and  as  there  was  no  signed  contract,, 
the  union  had  no  redress.  A  strike  was  called,  and  the  firm 
boycotted.  An  injunction  followed,  but  the  court  decided  in 
favor  of  the  strikers, — a  decision  that  was  later  reversed. 
The  firm  then  played  its  trump  card.  A  notice  was  posted 
that  everyone  employed  in  any  of  their  workrooms  in  Bos- 
ton must  join  their  Employees'  Association  or  quit  work.  A 
general  strike  at  this  time  would  have  only  resulted  in  fail- 
ure. The  president,  a  woman  still  influential  in  "the  move- 
ment," said  that  she  had  not  recovered  from  the  hard  times 
of  1893  and  '94,  and  she  couldn't  advise  the  women  to  take 
the  risks  involved  in  giving  up  their  jobs.  They  joined  the 
Employees'  Association,  and  it  soon  developed  that  mem- 
bership in  the  union  was  inconsistent  with  this  new  obliga- 
tion, and  that  one  or  the  other  must  be  given  up.  It  was 
a  case  of  sacrificing  their  "jobs"  or  the  union  at  a  time 

26 


when  "jobs"  were  scarce,  and  they  gave  up  the  union, 
though  most  of  them  honestly  believed  in  it. 

No  accurate  history  of  unionism  among  the  tailoring 
trades  of  Boston  could  fail  to  note  the  effect  of  the  Rus- 
sian Jewish  immigration,  which  began  in  the  early  nineties. 
By  tradition  many  of  these  immigrants  regarded  the  cloth- 
ing trade  as  an  occupation  to  which  they  were  adapted. 
Their  standards  of  living  were  not  those  of  American  work- 
men and  their  advent  at  a  time  when  the  country  was  un- 
dergoing a  financial  panic,  created  one  of  the  too  familiar 
tragedies  which  prove  how  world-wide  is  the  problem  of 
industrial  betterment. 

No  other  attempt  was  made  to  organize  the  women  in 
the  trade  until  1901,  when  five  or  six  hundred  coat,  pants 
and  vest  workers  were  brought  into  one  union  in  order  that 
the  label  might  be  used.  Most  of  these  women  were 
foreigners,  who  could  not  speak  English,  and  who  had  not 
the  smallest  understanding  of  what  organization  meant. 
They  took  no  interest  in  the  affairs  of  the  union  and  practi- 
cally never  came  to  meetings.  The  president  and  secre- 
tary, the  two  Irish-American  officers,  transacted  all  of  the 
business,  the  president  also  acting  as  business  agent.  There 
is  little  doubt  that  many  of  the  women  worked  below  the 
scale  and  that  the  organization  did  not  mean  much  to  them. 
The  men  felt  that  the  women  were  bidding  below  the  scale 
and  that  the  union  was  being  used  as  a  tool  to  further  the 
personal  ends  of  a  few.  They  declared  that  an  organiza- 
tion of  this  sort,  where  there  was  no  "union  spirit,"  was 
worse  than  none,  and  that  it  might  as  well  go  to  pieces. 

After  it  was  dissolved  in  1903  an  effort  was  at  once 
made  by  the  men  in  the  Coat,  Pants  and  Vest  Makers' 
Unions  to  get  these  same  women  into  the  unions  with  them, 
tut  few  of  the  women  who  belonged  to  the  old  union  have 
ever  joined  any  one  of  these  men's  locals. 

The  men  have  a  most  difficult  problem  to  face.  They 
try  to  maintain  the  same  wage  scale  for  both  men  and 
women,  and  to  protect  the  rights  of  the  women  employees ; 
but  it  is  difficult  to  do  either  of  these  things  so  long  as  the 
women  refuse  to  come  into  the  organization.  An  officer 
of  one  of  these  unions  complained  that  the  women  came 

27 


to  the  men  and  asked  to  have  the  union  interfere  when  "the 
boss  had  treated  them  unfairly.  They  are  always  being 
worked  over  hours,  and  now  and  then  the  bosses  will  take 
a  woman  by  the  neck  and  throw  her  out.  But  we  keep  on. 
telling  the  women  that  if  they  want  us  to  help  them  they've 
got  to  come  into  the  union." 

At  the  present  time  there  are  about  twenty-five  women 
in  the  coat  makers'  local,  a  large  organization  of  five  hun- 
dred members,  and  these  twenty-five  are  there  because 
they  work  in  "label  shops."  In  the  pressmen's  union  there 
are  now  three  women  members,  an  interesting  fact  because 
pressing,  like  cutting,  is  very  generally  considered  "men's 
work."  One  of  these  women  takes  a  very  lively  interest  in 
union  affairs,  and  this  year  ran  for  the  office  of  "label 
agent,"  who  gets  a  regular  salary  for  keeping  an  oversight 
of  the  employers'  use  of  the  label. 

In  the  pants  and  vest  makers'  locals,  the  situation  is 
much  the  same  as  among  the  coat  makers.  Most  of  the 
women  working  on  coats  are  Italians  and  the  majority  of 
the  pants  and  vest  workers  are  Jewish,  a  very  lacge  per- 
centage of  whom  cannot  speak  English.  They  not  only 
do  not  know  how  to  demand  their  rights,  but  they  do  not 
know  what  their  rights  are.  They  know  that  the  world 
goes  hard  with  them,  but  there  seem  to  be  so  many  diffi- 
culties that  they  have  no  hope  of  overcoming  them.  More- 
over the  general  feeling  is  that  although  the  men  have  al- 
ways stood  by  the  women  in  the  time  of  a  strike  and  have 
treated  them  fairly  in  the  union,  yet  they  are  far  from 
being  reconciled  to  women  competitors,  and  often  in  the 
shop  have  almost  refused  to  work  with  them,  and  as  a  re- 
sult more  and  more  of  the  work, — even  such  light  work  as 
basting,  is  being  done  by  men. 

Finishing  is  still  largely  done  at  home,  though  the 
union  is  fighting  this  everywhere,  as  the  cigar  makers  have 
fought  tenement  house  work  in  their  trade,  but  there  is  the 
added  difficulty  here  that  even  when  the  employers  want 
the  women  to  work  on  the  premises,  the  latter  refuse.  This 
is  because  the  work  is  very  heavy  and  is  left  for  the  older 
women,  to  whom  leaving  home  is  out  of  the  question,  the 
younger  girls  preferring  to  work  in  "white  goods"  fac- 
tories. 

28 


(3.)     Ladies  Garment  Workers'  Unions. 

Four  attempts  have  been  made  to  organize  the  women 
employed  in  the  various  branches  of  the  women's  ready- 
made  clothing  industry.  These  organizations  were  all  the 
work  of  the  energy  and  enthusiasm  of  one  man,  a  resident 
in  a  North  End  Settlement,  an  old  garment  worker  him- 
self, and  at  one  time  an  organizer  for  the  National  Union. 
He  has  had  the  courage  that  belongs  with  faith,  and  has 
tried  again  and  again,  in  spite  of  repeated  discouragements, 
to  interest  a  wholly  apathetic  set  of  people.  The  making 
of  women's  clothing  is  all  done  by  women,  except  the  cut- 
ting, which  is  still  regarded  as  "men's  work."  The  larger 
proportion  of  the  women  are  power-machine  operatives 
and,  in  nationality,  they  are  largely  Jewish.  Wages  and 
conditions  generally  are  much  better  than  in  the  making 
of  men's  clothing.  There  is  no  strong  men's  organization 
to  aid  the  women  in  forming  a  union,  no  persistent  and 
hopeful  leader  within  the  trade,  and  no  immediate  crying 
abuse  to  remedy, — the  kind  of  situation,  in  short,  that  is 
quite  hopeless  from  the  point  of  view  of  organization. 

The  first  union  started  was  one  among  the  wrapper 
makers  in  1902, — a  union  that  for  a  time  was  quite  success- 
ful, but  of  which  there  now  remains  only  an  unexpended 
fund  of  sixty-five  dollars !  A  union  among  the  shirt-waist 
makers  was  formed  in  1903,  but  that  too  was  unsuccessful. 
In  the  same  year  the  white  goods  workers  tried  to  organize 
during  a  strike.  The  girls  had  been  taxed  for  their  ma- 
chines, and  their  wage  scale  was  so  low  that  some  remedy 
seemed  necessary.  The  over  supply  of  labor  was,  how- 
ever, too  great  at  this  time,  and  no  permanent  organization 
was  effected.  One  difficulty  in  the  way  of  organization  in 
the  trade  has  been  the  large  preponderance  of  Jewish  girls 
employed.  While  they  are  emotional  and  easily  stirred  by 
appeals  from  an  enthusiastic  organizer,  it  is  very  difficult 
to  hold  them  together  after  the  union  has  been  once 
formed.  They  are,  too,  very  likely  to  marry  young  and 
almost  invariably  stop  work  after  marriage,  so  that  there 
is  a  constant  change  in  the  body  of  employees.  On  the 
whole  the  outlook  for  organization  is  scarcely  more  hopeful 
in  this  than  in  the  other  branches  of  the  garment  making 

29 


industry.  Here,  however,  it  is  not  so  difficult  to  start  a 
union  as  it  is  to  hold  one  together  after  it  has  been  formed. 
The  nucleus  of  faithful  and  active  workers  within  the  trade 
itself  that  can  be  depended  on  to  carry  a  union  through 
periods  of  distress  is  still  waiting  to  be  formed. 


3° 


MISCELLANEOUS      ORGANIZATIONS:  —  CIGAR- 
ETTE MAKERS'  UNION,  MUSICIANS'  PRO- 
TECTIVE ASSOCIATION,  AND  TELE- 
GRAPHERS' UNION, 
(i.)     Cigarette  Makers'  Union. 

In  the  summer  of  1905  there  was  formed  among  the 
cigarette  makers  a  very  small  union,  which  is  now  affiliated 
with  the  National  Tobacco  Workers'  Union  and  with  the 
American  Federation  of  Labor.  Two  other  small  organiza- 
tions had  been  attempted  in  1903  and  1904,  but  the  mem- 
bers were  young  girls  under  fifteen,  who  were  not  able 
to  manage  a  union.  The  present  union  has  fewer  than 
twenty  members,  both  women  and  men,  and  the  woman 
who  acts  as  secretary,  is  the  only  member  who  can  read, 
write,  or  understand  English,  though  some  of  the  men  are 
trying  hard  to  learn.  Cigarette  making  is,  however,  only  a 
small  industry  here,  and  the  employees  are,  most  of  them, 
either  Jewish  or  Greek.  The  union  is  now  a  label  union, 
but  it  was  a  voluntary  organization  in  the  beginning,  and 
the  demand  for  the  label  was  created  by  the  union  after  it 
was  formed.  The  union  has  a  plan  for  a  co-operative  fac- 
tory with  stock  to  be  sold  in  small  shares,  but  as  yet  no 
steps  have  been  taken  to  realize  it.  The  dues  are  fifteen 
cents  a  week  and  a  sick  benefit  of  three  dollars  a  week  is 
paid  when  necessary.  In  the  first  year  of  its  history  the 
organization  has  gained  a  shorter  work  day  and  an  increase 
in  wages. 

(2.)     Musicians'  and  Telegraphers'   Organisations. 

Within  the  last  few  years  women  have  come  into  the 
musicians'  and  telegraphers'  unions,  though  they  form  as 
yet  but  a  small  percentage  of  the  total  membership.  The 
men,  however,  have  come  to  recognize  that  the  woman  is 
a  dangerous  competitor  so  long  as  she  can  underbid  them, 
and  they  see  as  the  one  remedy  the  necessity  of  bringing 
the  women  into  the  unions  so  that  they  cannot  work  below 
the  men's  wage  scale.  It  is  probable,  therefore,  that  a 
greater  effort  will  be  made  by  the  men  to  bring  the  women 
into  the  trade  than  has  been  done  heretofore. 

31 


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